Identity Unknown (A Parker & Coe, Love and Bullets Thriller Book 1) (10 page)

Ridiculous.
 

There had to be something we could do to help Haley get the care she needed. Unfortunately, I wasn't a rich woman and had never rubbed elbows with anyone who was.

"What you need to concentrate on now," I said, "is the real Mia Duncan. You need to find her and collect that reward."

Parker rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling, absently rubbing the bruises on his chest. "And how am I supposed to do that?"

"You know what she looks like now. That's a step in the right direction."

"A step. But it doesn't do me much good if I don't have the resources to follow up. A facial recognition scan might tell me who she really is, but I've got no way of making that happen."

"Don't you have any friends who can do it?"

"I used to. But once you get the boot, those friends tend to close ranks and shut you out. You're no longer part of the tribe. And what if Taggart isn't the only one involved with the Ukrainians? It's too much of a risk."

"Aren't there private agencies that can do this facial recognition thing?"

"Sure," he said. "But without access to all the law enforcement databases, their reach is limited. Besides, they cost money, and my bank account is bone dry."

I sighed. "Too bad you don't have some computer wizard on tap who could hack into the police network and…"
 

I paused, a sudden thought occurring.

"What?" he asked.

"I just realized I might know someone who can do that."

Parker hiked up on his elbows. "Who?"

"This computer geek in my Cultural Theory class. He's asked me out a few times but I keep putting him off. He claims to be some kind of black hat badass, and if he's as good as he thinks he is, he should be able to help us."

"Us?"

"Just because
you
believe me now, doesn't mean Taggart and his friends will. I've got just as much stake in finding Emily as you do."

"Good point. Do you know how to get hold of this guy?"

"No," I said. "But I have a way of finding out."

PART THREE

Oh Where Oh Where

Can She Be?

Cody Grimshaw's apartment was located about a block north of HCU, in an area known as Grad Student Row.
 

Cody was not a grad student himself, but had once told me over coffee at the campus cafeteria that he had never been the party type and wanted to avoid the dorms and undergrad block at all cost. He needed peace and quiet, he said, and most of the grad block residents had gotten the party bug out of their systems.

I didn't know the exact location of Cody's place. But I did know a way to get his phone number, which was posted prominently on the Student Center bulletin board, where fliers touted his computer repair services.

Parker and I got dressed and made our way there on trembling legs—the good kind, this time—while keeping an eye out for any black SUVs and Taggart's patrol car. I found Cody's number, then went to the one and only pay phone on campus, which was located right next to the Student Center bookstore.

A groggy voice answered on the fifth ring.

"…Uh?"

"Cody?"

"…uh, yeah, who is this?"

"It's Kelsey. I'm sorry to bother you so early but I need your—"

He was suddenly awake. "Kelsey? Kelsey Coe?"

"Do you know any other Kelseys?"

"Uh, no, uh—I just figured the last person who'd ever call me is you."

"Why would you think that?"

"You made it pretty clear that you weren't interested and—"

"That doesn't mean I don't consider you a friend," I said.

Of course, it didn't help that we usually only saw each other in class, and coffee at the campus cafeteria was far from a regular thing.
 

"Anyway," I went on, "I've got a bit of an emergency and I need your help."

"What kind of emergency?"

"Life or death. Can I come over? I need to speak to you in person."

"It's like three in the morning. And I've only had two hours sleep."

"I'm sorry, Cody, but this really is life or death. I don't know who else to call."

"So I take it's a computer thing?"

"More of a hacker thing, really."

"Hacker?"

"I need you to break into someplace you don't belong."

There was just enough of a pause that I wondered if I had crossed a line of some sort.

Then he said, "Well, shit. Why didn't you tell me that in the first place?"

"Who the hell is
this
?" Cody asked.

He stood in his doorway, staring directly at Parker, who waited behind me in the apartment house corridor. Cody looked exactly as you might expect him to look after only a couple hours sleep.
 

I knew how he felt.

"He's a friend of mine," I said. "He's part of the reason I need your help."

"He looks like a cop. Are you a cop?"

"Used to be," Parker said. "Not anymore."

Cody shifted his gaze to me, his eyes so red you could use them to adjust the color on your television screen. "So let me get this straight. You want me to do something potentially illegal in front of this guy?"

"Not potentially," I said. "But don't worry, he's cool with it."

"Doesn't mean
I
am. Is he like your boyfriend or something?"

"I just met him last night." I thought about all that had transpired since then and felt a bit self-conscious, thinking Parker and I had the telltale look of two people who had just rolled out of bed. Or off a computer lab carpet. "Are you gonna let us in or not?"

Cody eyed us warily, then finally stepped aside and let us pass. "If I don't get at least one date out of this, I am the world's biggest loser."

"I'll go on a dozen dates with you if you can do what we need you to do."

He grinned. "Does that mean you'll sleep with me, too?"

I turned to Parker. "This was a mistake. Let's go."

Cody held up his hands. "Relax, all right? I was joking. But a guy can dream, can't he?"

I didn't want to think about what kind of dreams he had in mind, but I let it pass.
 

"Fine," I said. "Why don't we get down to business?"

He gestured. "Sure, have a seat. Tell me what you need."

We looked around the room for a place to sit, but the sofa and chairs were piled high with comic books in plastic sleeves. Every other surface, including the floor, seemed to be littered with miniature action figures. Across from the sofa was a computer desk, flush against the wall, with six computer monitors on top.

That's right. Six. Two rows of three.

Why on earth would anyone need that many monitors?

Cody hustled to remove a couple stacks of the comics off the sofa and again told us to sit. I took him up on the invitation, but Parker opted to shove his hands in his pockets and stay on his feet.

Cody glanced at him nervously, then spun his swivel chair away from the desk and sat facing us. "Okay, so what's the big emer…" He paused, frowning at my dirty bare feet. "What happened to your shoes?"

"Long story," I said, then pulled a thumb drive from my pants pocket.
 

Parker had procured it from the lab attendant's desk, located in a far corner of the Blue Ridge computer room. The desk had been locked, but Parker did a little maneuver with a pick he kept in his wallet that I'd found almost as impressive as his not so little deputy.

I held the drive out to Cody. "There's a picture of a woman on here. The name she gave me is Emily Finn, but she's also known as Mia Duncan. We figure that's probably an alias, too."

Cody took it from me and turned it in his fingers. "And what do you want me to do?"

"Run it through a facial recognition scanner," Parker said. "Try to see what you can dig up."

Cody frowned. "Do I look like cop central here? What makes you think I have facial recognition software?"

"We don't," I said. "But the Houston U.S. Marshal's office has it, and I figured if you've really got those mean wizard skills you're always bragging about, you can tap into their network and run the photo."

Cody looked offended. "I'm not always bragging about it."

"Really? Every time I talk to you, you offer to change my Econ grade and tell me nobody'll ever know you were in the system. Was that just talk or do you really have the skills?"

"Okay, so I brag a little."

"That doesn't answer her question," Parker said. "Are you capable of doing this or not?"

Cody puffed himself up. "Yeah, I can do it, but screw the U.S. Marshal's office. The Hunter City PD has the same software and a network that's so full of holes it's a joke."

"So you've done it before?"

"Once or twice. Just for a laugh."

Parker gestured to the computer screens. "Then let's get to it."

It sounded more like a command than a request and Cody bobbed his head affirmatively, then spun around and shoved the thumb drive into a USB slot.
 

A moment later the screen blossomed with the photograph of a comely redhead wearing nothing but a pink barrette, her legs positioned in a way that suggested she was a lifelong contortionist.
 

"Whoa," Cody said. "Is this the woman you're talking about?"

Parker's face reddened and he shook his head. "That must have been on the drive already. Click forward."

Cody did as he was told and after several more shots of the redhead in painful poses (showing us more of her anatomy than any normal human being could ever want to see), he finally found the photo of Emily and me.

"That's her," I said. "Emily Finn aka Mia Duncan. We need everything you can find on her."

"You look like twins."

"And therein lies the problem," Parker told him.

"So what is this—like a stolen identity thing?"

"Something like that. How long do you think this'll take?"

Cody shrugged. "Getting in takes seconds, but it might be a few hours before we get a hit, assuming we get one at all."

"She didn't just materialize," Parker told him. "With her reputation, she's bound to have something on record."

Cody frowned. "Who exactly is this woman?"

"That's what we're trying to figure out," I said.

It took nearly four hours to get a hit.

I had fallen asleep on the sofa and Parker had made room on a chair and stretched his legs out. He was dozing when Cody's computer started beeping, jarring us both awake.

Cody was nowhere in sight.

I got to my feet and looked at the monitors, but they were all blank. As the computer continued to beep, I turned, worked my way through the maze of junk and found Cody in the bedroom. He was sprawled across his mattress in a pair of tighty whities, his mouth open, drooling on the bed sheet.

I nudged his foot. "Cody wake up, your computer is beeping."

He stirred and mumbled something, but didn't wake.

I nudged him again. "Come on, Cody, I think we've got a hit."

He stirred again, but still no joy.

I climbed onto the mattress and got close to his ear. "Cody,
get up
. Your computer is beeping."

His eyes flew open. After a moment of confusion, he registered my face and smiled. "I wish every morning could start like this."

"And I wish you slept with clothes on. Now hurry up and get dressed. I want to see what it found."

When we got into the living room, Parker was standing at the computer, jabbing at keys on the keyboard, trying to get the beast to shut the hell up.

Cody—now wearing a ratty terrycloth robe—said, "You're wasting your time," then motioned him aside and pressed a thumb against what I assumed was a fingerprint reader to the right of the keyboard. A second later the beeping stopped and the screens came to life.

On the center top screen was the facial recognition software showing an enlarged version of the photo we'd given to Cody, cropped to isolate Emily in the frame. There was a translucent red grid superimposed over her face, and the words
ACCURACY: 100%
in the lower left corner of the screen.

That looked promising.

On the screen directly below this, was another photo of Emily—this one a somber mug shot, complete with slate marked
AUSTIN PD
, dated eight years earlier.

Eight years?

If she was the same age as me—as she had claimed—then that would make her sixteen at the time this mug shot was taken. But there was no way that Emily was younger than twenty in the photo, which would make her at least twenty-eight today.

So she'd lied about that, too.

"Is there a file attached to this?" Parker asked.

Cody hit a few keys and a document filled the screen. "Says here she was arrested for soliciting prostitution in downtown CS under the name Anastasia Brantov."

Parker and I exchanged a look.

The name sounded Ukrainian.

I thought about Taggart's friends in the black SUV.
 

"What else does it say?" I asked.

"Not much. Just that bail was posted and a court date was set."

"Who posted bail?" Parker said. "Her?"

Cody squinted at the screen and shook his head. "Some guy named Papanov."

Parker and I exchanged another look. "
Anton
Papanov?"

"That's the one, yeah."

In case you've forgotten in all the excitement, Anton Papanov was the businessman Emily had assassinated in Houston. Posing as a call girl, no less. And if she'd known Papanov well enough to be bailed out by him eight years ago, what was their relationship and why had she killed him?

And, assuming Taggart's friends were Papanov's associates, why didn't they know what she looked like?

Parker said, "Are there any other files attached to this one?"

Cody hit a few keys and scrolled through the pages. "Some court documents. That's about it. Looks like she was convicted and paid a thousand dollar fine."